Tag: past

My Mom and Dad moved back on to the family farm, when I was about four. Dad had worked in the oilfield, but he wanted to farm. Grandpa Pat was ready to slow down, and then died. We moved into the old farm house. It was a sea foam green two story house, that originally only had an outhouse. Grandpa and Grandma had taken a porch and made it into a small den, bathroom and enlarged the kitchen area. It sat on a dirt basement, with a coal burning stove that heated the house, sometimes. In the coldest days of the winter months, we would all sleep in the living room, with a blanket blocking off the kitchen-half of the house, the door shut to the upstairs, and the furnace full of coal, trying to heat that little bit of house we were sleeping in. We didn’t mind much; we were warm, and it was “camping out” to us kids.

The only thing we had to worry about on those nights, is that the mice wanted to be warm too. They would come up from the basement, and risk life-or-death, by running around. They especially liked to surprise you in the bathroom. I would be sitting on the toilet, and a mouse, or two would come out and look at me. We both had our jobs to do-me finishing my toileting and them trying to survive.

Dad would periodically catch a bull snake and release him into the basement, to try and control the population, but never seemed to make much difference. It only made going down to get canned goods more interesting, as I was terrified, the mouse would survive and I would not.

Dad later gave the house away to the mover, who sold or gave it to someone in the White Earth Valley. Dad told me in later years they used it for their animals. We built a new house, whose only infiltrators were salamanders, or a calf or lamb, who were brought in by the humans.

I was lucky enough to have repeat performances of mouse escapades, when I lived in a 12×60 trailer house in an oil camp, in 1978-1982. I was visiting with my mother-in- law on the phone, when I saw the tinfoil move, that was covering the roast beef on the counter. I looked again in time to see a mouse pull a piece of beef off the plate, slide it across a bit of counter and take it down behind the stove. There were times I would be laying in bed nursing my oldest son, and a mouse would come out from his hiding and look up at me, with no fear in his eyes. We were outnumbered.

When we sold that trailer house, very soon after that, I pictured it going down the road to Billings, Montana; the mice waving goodbye as they began their new adventure.

An interesting insight into my life on the farm? I have tried to give you a few of them, so you know who I am; based on my experiences you can see when we are similar. So you can believe me, when I tell you I understand where many of you have been.

I was watching TV one morning, working on a Soduko puzzle. I’m trying to keep my brain more toned than my body. The announcement came on that Charlie Rose had been suspended. I set my puzzle down and tried to take it in; I’m obviously not one of those people oblivious to abuse; I’ve had my share of it, in several different versions, but Charlie Rose… I didn’t see that coming. Many of the broadcasters have made the point of saying, how do we balance our feelings for someone we care about, who has done something so wrong. I don’t care if it’s the Senator from Michigan, or Alabama, or our favorite morning news commentator, the President, or family member. It hurts when someone we respect, betrays trust.

How do we balance our feelings? By lashing out at others? The women in this case, and there have been men in other cases as well, are like mice…They for whatever reason, have held on for five, or ten, or 40 years. Their lives were changed, but they survived by doing what they had to do. Victims are like mice, stories of abuse are like mice…if there is one, there is more.

The stories in the news have been mostly sexual abuse of power, but my analogy can be any form of abuse. I have thoughts and prayers in my heart right now for people who are physically, emotionally, and verbally abused as well. Verbal and emotional abuse leave no outward physical scars, but the damage is so difficult to overcome. Please don’t become so comfortable with it, because of your family, or culture that you don’t pay attention to the mice.

The handprint quilted into the quilt above is mine. Surrounding it are the handprints of my husband and grandchildren. Twenty-seven years ago, I was sitting in the passenger seat of a pick-up truck headed to Wyoming. We were delivering some oilfield supplies. My children’s father was driving; it was late at night; the marriage was failing and I was thinking about my friend who was dying of cancer. The idea for the quilt came to me; I don’t know how or why, but it did, and I started it the next week. Different shapes, of different colors, were hand appliquéd onto a white piece of fabric. I bought the thread intending to hand quilt it, with the different colors running through the quilt, an alternating triangle border pulling it together.

I often wondered why, when you would hear the stories of quilts, uncompleted, “discovered” in an attic, or box in a closet, they weren’t finished. I learned, and understand now, life has it’s own plan sometimes, and it might not include finishing a quilt. I carried the quilt, and it’s thread, from home to home, town to town, from the end of one marriage, through the failing of another, until now. Children grew up and had children of their own; I found a good marriage, a happy place and decided I was ready to finish it.

The quilt like my life, metamorphised a bit; I needed to find a couple of replacement triangles that almost match; a couple spools of thread disappeared and had to be replaced; the stitches are bigger, and there were stains from the colored fabric bleeding onto the white. My quilt and I have aged. The colors match others I have chosen for our house, it will still keep a child, or grandchild warm, and if my husband wants to snuggle under it, while the fireplace warms up the house, it will keep us warm as well, while reminding us of the love of the handprints-the best warmth of all.

Our pasts never really leave us. We can modify them, redirect them and flat out lie about them, but they are still our pasts. Bring your past into your future, embrace it and quilt it together with your future. I hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving, with many things to be thankful for, both past and present.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

To laugh often and much; To win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children; To earn the appreciation of honest critics and to endure the betrayal of false friends; To appreciate beauty; To find the best in others; To leave the world a bit better by a healthy child, a garden patch or a redeemed social condition; To know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded.

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